FXAI: Fusing XAI for Predicting COVID-19 Using Diverse Chest X - Ray Images

Fusing explainable artificial intelligence (FXAI) is currently a prominent research topic in medical imaging interpretations. The proposed FXAI has the capability to provide the following benefits. Firstly, it can extract strong and reliable high-level deep features by combining various standard AI networks. Secondly, it can simultaneously generate visual explainable saliency maps associated with each chest X-ray (CXR) scan. Such heat maps not only demonstrate the most relevant regions of the AI decision-making process but also offer advantages to radiologists and patients. Thirdly, it enhances prediction performance to deliver an optimal intelligent solution for communities worldwide. These advantages can support the development of an optimal treatment plan, reduce medical costs, and enhance the capabilities of health care systems. We have trained and evaluated the proposed FXAI using a diverse benchmark medical CXR dataset that has been collected from various public resources. Our findings encourage researchers and stakeholders in the medical industry to validate this proposed framework in a practical manner.